Five months later, five more chains land on ‘healthy’ list

In October in this space, I made fun of a new Web site called HealthyDiningFinder.com, which purports to identify restaurants in or near your city or ZIP code that offer “menu choices to fit your healthy lifestyle.”

By the site’s own admission, the 30,000 locations identified are almost exclusively comprised of 250 national or regional chains, “plus a few independents.”

That’s because the chains use standardized recipes, whereas most local restaurants change their menus more often and can’t afford the expense of having their dishes analyzed. (Denny’s spent $18,000 to get nutritional stats on its food, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest.)

Since many chains already make the info available in their restaurants or on their Web sites, HealthyDiningFinder.com is just another advertising outlet.

In addition to the restaurants listed on the site for our area in October — Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Arby’s and Buca di Beppo — HDF has added Burger King, Chili’s, Macaroni Grill, Hooter’s and Ponderosa.

The foods listed as healthy are unsurprising. Any bonehead can figure out that the side garden salad at Burger King is a good choice — as long as you skip the dressing. Two ounces of Ken’s Light Italian Dressing add 11 grams of fat and 120 calories, or eight times as many calories in the salad itself.

A column I wrote on the subject of nutritional information on menus is after the jump. The state legislation mentioned in the column has yet to pass but has again been reintroduced.

But as a restaurant professional — vice president of food and beverage operations at White Management, the company that owns area Mangia and Butcher Block eateries — Burgasser deeply opposes a bill pending in the state Assembly that would require chain restaurants to print nutrition information on their menus.

As well he should.

New York is one of a half-dozen states whose legislatures recently have considered such a bill, according to the National Restaurant Association. Although the bills died in three states, they’re still being discussed in California, Pennsylvania and here; the New York bill’s sponsor, Assemblyman Felix Ortiz, D-Brooklyn, predicts unanimous passage in the next few weeks. At the federal level, matching Menu Education and Labeling bills were introduced in the House and Senate in November and this month, respectively.

The national legislation takes aim at fast-food and sit-down chains with more than 20 restaurants. Ortiz’s stricter bill would impose the nutrition-labeling mandate on any owner of five or more establishments in New York.

Sponsors of the federal MEAL bills and pro-labeling groups like the Center for Science in the Public Interest insist they’re only after chains. Independently owned eateries, they promise, needn’t worry about being next.

Ortiz, though, freely ‘fesses up to hoping for a domino effect. In a few years, he says, he’d like to see every food-service establishment, whether McDonald’s or lunch carts, posh food temples or mom-and-pop pizzerias, displaying calories, fat grams and other nutrition information right alongside prices. “We want the invisible” — i.e., nutrition details — “to be visible,” he says. “This will lower health care costs. … It will impact the world.”

He’s right about the latter claim, but not in a good way.

Yes, yes, yes: Obesity is a problem. Federal health officials call it an epidemic, noting that about two-thirds of Americans qualify as overweight or obese, a statistic that had a price tag of $117 billion in 2000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And countless studies show that people make better eating choices when nutritional information is printed on their packaged foods, as required by the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990.

In many cases, such statistics already are easily accessible for chain-restaurant patrons — as a result of companies responding to market forces and otherwise competing for customers. The menu boards at Subway shops blare nutritional figures; the company reports that customers say it helps them stick to their diets, whether they’re carb-counting Atkins followers or calorie-reducing low-fat folks. And Chili’s “Guiltless Grill” menu items have noted fat grams since 1993.

On the other end of the healthy scale, even McDonald’s, which recently announced Happy Meals for adults featuring salad, bottled water and a pedometer, is (relatively) upfront about the fact that its 21-ounce Chocolate Triple Thick Shake has 750 calories and 22 grams of fat.

All of those were voluntary decisions. But even legally requiring nutrition information on chain-restaurant menus wouldn’t be too burdensome for their parent companies. The total tab for adding nutritional statistics to the menus at every Denny’s in America, including the cost of analysis and the reprinting of menus, was $18,000 — $10 per location, according to Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, headquartered in Washington, D.C. (CSPI, admittedly, is biased; it’s the group that periodically issues alarmist reports that advise we’d be better off injecting butter directly into our veins than eating movie-theater popcorn, for example.)

But mandating nutrition details on all menus would seriously harm independent restaurants. Such laws would be financially punishing and hard to comply with. They’re also antithetical to the way a true chef works.

“It would be a nightmare,” says Angelo Mazzone, owner of Glen Sanders Mansion, the large restaurant and catering operation in Scotia.

Here’s why:

Cost: Analysis is expensive. The Food Consulting Co., a California firm that has assessed nutrition information for many packaged-food companies and chain restaurants, charges $650 per dish for laboratory nutrition analysis. Multiply that by every appetizer, soup, salad, entree and dessert on the menu, and you’re getting into huge sums.

Difficulty of compliance: Once nutrition values are determined, each dish would have to be made exactly the same way every time — always 6 ounces of veal, not 6 1/2, 1 tablespoon of oil, 4 ounces of tomato sauce and so on — in order for it to match the nutrition values asserted by the menu. While not impossible, it’s impractical. It’s also soulless.

“That would take away a chef’s creative license,” says Burgasser. “When that happens, you become institutionalized. … Each of our chefs has his own little personal nuances, and that’s what separates the independents from the mass production of the chains.”

He concludes, “We’re making it fresh every time. We’re not just opening Sauce Packet No. 5.”

Steve Barnes

16 Responses

Analysis might be expensive and compliance difficult, and I sympathize. I don’t support the law as written.

But I’m also an insulin-dependent (Type 1, non-obesity related) diabetic, and have been for 22 years and counting. Each time I sit down to eat, at home, with friends, or at a restaurant, I constantly have to run a calculation in my head of at least how many carbs, fat and protein are in each thing I eat – not to mention the running tally I have to keep during the day in combination with adjusting my insulin rates to keep my blood sugars stable. If I can do this in my head, I don’t know that it can be that hard for restaurants to provide a good-faith guesstimate of a few key items on their menus.

The legislators could help by issuing standard food guidelines – e.g., a list of calories or carbohydrates, fat and protein in common ingredients so that the host or someone could run a quick tally as the day’s menu is planned. I can’t tell you how immesurably easier it would make life for me, and other people with metabolic illnesses – especially because, for all my guesses and knowledge, I can’t know until I’m suffering the ill effects whether a chef has put sugar in the mushroom soup or tomato sauce or has used butter to cook the rice. All these things can throw off my estimates and screw up my blood sugar – leaving me to suffer potential blindess, nerve and kidney damage and amputation because I don’t know what goes on in the kitchen.

Right now, that’s part of the risk assessment every time I debate whether to eat outside my home. But I think there is a way to ask restaurants to provide some good-faith estimates of some basic information in a way that would improve their business and keep the health risks low.

UKMA, you don’t know what you are talking about, nor does half of what you are saying make any sense. The bars you mentioned did not all close because of “the dumb crowd”. The Long Branch was not shut down due to the “dumb crowd”, they were closed due to serving minors – owners decisions, not the crowd causing trouble. The Skyline was shut down due to financial reasons – nothing to do with the crowd, everything to do with the owners. Envy shut down due to serving minors, and Ballingers shut down on several occasions, due to financial reasons. While we are all clearly impressed by your expert partying, it is the not the “dumb crowd” that is shutting these clubs down, but poor management of the clubs. By the way, last time I sat at the Country Club or went to a rock concert, no one mentioned Plastic.

MCN (#1), I fully support your position. I am also a Type 1 diabetic, and have been for 72 years. As you well know, I do the same sort of constant mathematico-nutrito-emotional calculations each time I eat a meal, whether at home or at a restaurant (though thank goodness, my wife is at least as smart as I and is often way ahead in the calculations).

I’m not sure how much of an unsustainable burden it would be for non-chain restaurants to provide nutrition lists. For me, it doesn’t matter much since my experience has made me a good guesser.

But as far as I can tell, Steve is not sympathetic to the problems of Type 1 diabetics, as well as not being sympathetic to me personally. Some time ago, he accused me of harping on the fact although I had only brought it up once, or maybe twice, in several years of frequent posting. I think he just doesn’t want to hear about us and our problems, or to hear that it might be possible to assist us in solving those problems.

All right, Steve, prove it. You’ve said before that I keep bringing up my diabetes; now show me. (I AM from Missouri, you know.)

I can’t find any way of searching your blog to determine which of us is right. You doubtless are much better equipped than I. So kindly point to the last mention by me of this fact, and exactly how many times and where I’ve mentioned it.

I give credit to you for supporting a blog. But I know damn well you’re not a deity.

1) 2010/12/07 at 7:33 pmMCN (#1), I fully support your position. I am also a Type 1 diabetic, and have been for 72 years. As you well know, I do the same sort of constant mathematico-nutrito-emotional calculations each time I eat a meal, whether at home or at a restaurant (though thank goodness, my wife is at least as smart as I and is often way ahead in the calculations).

I’m not sure how much of an unsustainable burden it would be for non-chain restaurants to provide nutrition lists. For me, it doesn’t matter much since my experience has made me a good guesser.

But as far as I can tell, Steve is not sympathetic to the problems of Type 1 diabetics, as well as not being sympathetic to me personally. Some time ago, he accused me of harping on the fact although I had only brought it up once, or maybe twice, in several years of frequent posting. I think he just doesn’t want to hear about us and our problems, or to hear that it might be possible to assist us in solving those problems.
MCN (#1), I fully support your position. I am also a Type 1 diabetic, and have been for 72 years. As you well know, I do the same sort of constant mathematico-nutrito-emotional calculations each time I eat a meal, whether at home or at a restaurant (though thank goodness, my wife is at least as smart as I and is often way ahead in the calculations). I’m not sure how much of an unsustainable burden it would be for non-chain restaurants to provide nutrition lists. For me, it doesn’t matter much since my experience has made me a good guesser. But as far as I can tell, Steve is not sympathetic to the problems of Type 1 diabetics, as well as not being sympathetic to me personally. Some time ago, he accused me of harping on the fact although I had only brought it up once, or maybe twice, in several years of frequent posting. I think he just doesn’t want to hear about us and our problems, or to hear that it might be possible to assist us in solving those problems.
williepitt

2) 2010/08/28 at 9:35 pmOK, THAT Bob, what kind of a diabetic? Type 1 or Type 2?

I’m trying to find out whether you got it through no fault of your own (as I did) or by wrong diet choices.
williepitt

3) 2009/08/12 at 8:19 pmWow. An event that includes “light [whatever that means] refreshments” just at dinnertime for diabetics (or at least this diabetic). How perceptive!
williepitt

4) 2009/08/10 at 5:31 pmWell, I’m caught in several middles. What does this mean for Type 1 diabetics like me? What does it mean if you didn’t know for most of your 40′s how high your cholesterol was, but have cut it way back by medication in your 60′s and 70′s? And what does it mean if you’re in your mid-70′s and have no signs of dementia more severe than occasional “senior moments”?
williepitt

5) 2009/07/29 at 8:48 amSteve, I can find nothing in the article to suggest that the mandate goes any distance beyond calories. Do you know whether it includes such things as carbohydrate, fat and sodium content?

Most chain restaurants that provide calorie counts also now provide this other info, and it’s essential for diabetics like me. Seems to me the mandate shouldn’t stop at calories.
williepitt

6) 2009/07/17 at 4:19 pmI would point out, “J Jones” (#12), that no one claims the sort of meal served in this competition is “the standard American diet” or a “habit”, and anyone who takes it as such is living in cloud cuckoo land. Even those who get obese and court diabetes and renal failure probably don’t eat BBQ as a habitual diet. And all of us like some now & then.

So why not have a good sampling and donate to a good cause, without getting all guilty about it and trying to make others feel the same?

I speak as a diabetic myself, but a Type 1 who has had it for over 70 years and is still in good health, with no renal failure on the horizon.
williepitt

7) 2009/06/25 at 5:32 pmOh, how I wish I’d been sent to a diabetic camp when I was a kid, more than 65 years ago! I might have gotten independent much earlier than I did. I recommend this event to everyone who wants to help people reach their full potential.
williepitt

Don’t forget WP’s well-documented love for all pastries poppy seed. Once I brought up his frequently-mentioned diabetes when he was waxing romantic about his favorite sweet treats. That was a mistake. Comments about diabetes and comments about pastry are not appreciated when they appear on the same thread.

When willipit isn’t correcting grammar, he makes interesting comments. So, yes, there is someone interested in some of him statements. Considering the number of willipit’s posts, eleven mentions of diabetes isn’t really excessive. I’ve mentioned being a parent, dining with a child, etc. just as often. Diabetes is relevant to food discussions.

MCN (#1)- I agree, and I wish restaurants made it easier to estimate the breakdown of calories.

LOL. Steve, I guarantee you missed some, as I know I have called out WP on this specifically because my father was a Type 1 of a similar age as WP and never saw it as the world’s issue to deal with, just his own.

You also missed WP’s famous comment (which admittedly may have been on another TU site) where he made sure all knew that Type 1 was genetics, not to be confused with the fat slobs who get Type 2–he didn’t want to be associated!